There’s a prevalent and long-perpetuated myth about innovators, that they are persistent; they don’t give up. Renowned innovators like Henry Ford and Thomas Edison have even said it of themselves, crediting their success in part on their persistence. But it’s at best a poor choice of words and at worst a fundamental misunderstanding of what innovation entails, even by some of its best practitioners.

Whether based on the economy, health care legislation, or changes in purchaser mindset, it may be the perfect time for health care companies to step back from their BHAG’s in order to gain some innovation perspective. Have the big questions changed? Here is a question that may raise eyebrows: What does health care need? Health care needs a healthy dose of innovation. ...

What most distinguishes the innovation high performers from the less innovative is not some indiscernible secret sauce of mental faculties. What distinguishes them is their mindset. That is to say: their attitudes, assumptions and beliefs—their mental models—about how the world works. These mental models are often subconscious. Yet they can have a huge impact on someone’s behavior and therefore how well they perform—and innovate.

Five Glitches Sabotaging Your Plan What company, division or team isn’t striving for some combination of better, faster, cheaper in order to compete? A recent Korn/Ferry survey found that 84% of executives believe that innovation is very important to future success. No big surprise – everyone in the business and non-profit worlds seem to be talking innovation as mission critical. ...

Former Peace Corps worker borrows an idea to transform plastic bottles and inorganic trash into classrooms. Discover how in rural Guatemala, communities are working together to collect trash and bottles to use as building materials.

The reason why a lot of managers struggle with innovation is because they are too far removed from the commercial reality. Neal Thornberry, professor of Management at the American Babson College, explains it as follows:
Marketing presentations take the place of real opportunity analysis. They don’t know if they can make it, if anybody will buy it, for how long, at what price and how they will defend it against people trying to steal their market.

“The greatest thing since sliced bread,” implies a kind of automatic acceptance that wasn't true then and isn't now.
As someone who embraces innovation, it pains me to say it but apparently some things don’t change, at least not very much. Winning acceptance of any new idea is far from automatic.

You can only present an idea for the first time, once! So when you have the chance to present it to your board, be aware of the fact that a new product idea is not only ‘a creative product’ but also must comply to all the regular business criteria of your organisation too. Does it have (extra) turnover potential? Does ...

Great innovations are often based on powerful intuitions, but we all know examples of someone thinking they have a great intuition and being misguided. So where does intuition fit into innovation and how do we know when we can rely on it?